Choosing right IDE for web development is very important, so you had better choose the best one. Here we summarize top best IDE’s for web development use, you can choose anyone as your suitable one based on the features and your skills level.
Comparing to others, of course, there are more than 500 of IDE’s in the market of web development, but choosing over 500 of them isn’t that useful for everybody’s comparing.
Sublime Text. Freemium entry into the text editor market
Sublime Text is a powerful and ergonomically convenient multilingual text editor. It is a freemium software. You don’t have to buy it, but it will pester you if you don’t. And you should support the developer, really.
Its multi-cursor and multi-select features are loved by many programmers, as it allows for editing code in multiple places at once. However, it is considered to be strange and hard to get used to by others. It’s a matter of perspective.
Sublime Text also supports a lot of features useful for writing JavaScript. There are IntelliSense packages for JS as well. By the way, it has a decent Github integration. It is also relatively light and fast.
It is highly customizable, looks department included. Where it is lacking is in work environment features. The verdict is – a JavaScript editor of choice for a freelancer or a smaller work environment. A little less appealing to bigger companies.
Eclipse. An IDE with a good work environment feature
Although Eclipse is mostly known for being a prominent Java IDE, it’s also commonly used for JavaScript development. However, in order to be able to utilize JavaScript code in Eclipse, special plugins need to be installed. But once you get those plugins installed, you will ultimately find Eclipse very rewarding.
Eclipse team has recently put a lot of effort into making the platform as JavaScript-friendly as possible. As so, it supports open-source solutions like Docker UI and Docker CLI.
Light Table. Powerful BOT-engines and keymaps
It is an open-source development environment for JavaScript projects. The IDE was developed by the MIT team and funded via Kickstarter, collecting more than $300,000. LightTable provides feedback and code execution, assisting developers in quick abstraction creation.
The main features of the IDE include Behavior-Object Tag engines and customizable keymaps. A user can set a value for a code tracking system and monitor code quality in real-time.
Light Table allows several users to work in the environment simultaneously, editing the same code file. The interface includes a command pane, file tree, and the navigation pane. Additionally, the environment doesn’t require users to print the console – instead, they can check the code real-time, line by line.
Codelobster. IDE for JavaScript and PHP development
Although this development environment is best known to assist in PHP development, it’s also quite popular among JavaScript developers. The solution currently supports JavaScript, PHP, HTML, and CSS. This versatility makes the software one of the most fitting solutions for web development. It’s also a nice solution for teams that use both PHP and JavaScript in their development processes.
Additionally, Codelobster supports dozens of plugins that allow it to support Joomla, Drupal, JQuery, WordPress, Yii, and others. The IDE has a 30-day free trial version; paid memberships are divided into two categories – “Lite”, with limited upgrades, and “Professional” – the most functional version that provides full access to all features.
The software provides automated auto-completion and syntax checking and highlighting. The software supports single-user and multi-user versions, although, for team support, members need to acquire the paid subscription.
The development environment is supported by Windows, Mac, and Linux, and has 10 multilingual interfaces.
RJ TextEd. A go-to option for web development
This JS IDE is known as a universal web development environment, as it supports not only JavaScript but also HTML, CSS, PHP, and ASP. IDE provides smooth autocompletion, Unicode integration, code folding, sorting, and column interface mode. Interface settings allow choosing between multi-edit and multi-select modes, turn on annotation bars, and advanced sorting.
The IDE highlights syntax in LESS, SASS, and CSS, and includes an advanced color editor with dozens of formats. You can explore other built-in tools too, most developers’ favorites are code explorer, file explorer, and project manager.
RJ TextEd supports binary and ASCII files, as well as SFTP and FTP synchronization clients. It’s a versatile environment with HTML repair, validation, and format, and rich customization options – here, you have a chart map, color picker, and syntax editor.
NetBeans. A powerful code monitoring tool
NetBeans is a versatile IDE for web, mobile, and desktop development that supports HTML, JavaScript, PHP, C, and C++. This IDE is best known for powerful code monitoring and editing features, earning it the reputation of one of the best JS editors on the market. NetBeans supports Knockout and Node.js, making it a top choice for backend development.
The main features of the IDE are code editor, debugger, syntax highlights, and project management tool. The main features are functionality management, user settings customization, Visual Library integration, storage monitoring, and step-by-step dialog support.
The IDE has multiple translated interface, including English, Chinese, Russian, Portuguese, and other languages.
CodeLite. An open-source IDE for JS, C, C++, and PHP
CodeLite is an open-source development environment that supports JavaScript, PHP, C++, and C. The IDE is compatible with Windows, Mac, and Linux. The environment is integrated with Open Source compilers like GBD, MinGW, and FreeBSD.
The functionality of CodeLite is based on refactoring and code completion features, project management add-ons, syntax highlighting, and source browsing. Also, IDE allows UnitTest+++ integration, subversion and scope integration, and a source code editor.
The development team regularly updates the platform via its GitHub repository. CodeLite was translated into several languages, and new versions are constantly being added by the community.
Codelobster
Codelobster is an integrated development environment that was developed primarily for the Php programming languages. Today, it supports HTML, CSS, and JavaScript programming languages for web development. Codelobster is available in both free and paid versions with a load of plugins for Drupal, Joomla, etc.
Top Features:
- Syntax highlighting in-built.
- Smart autocomplete features with syntax checking.
- Paid plugin support available for major frameworks and languages.
- Web inspector in-built into it for inspecting the elements.
- Easy to manage documents in Codelobster.
Codeanywhere
Codeanywhere is a cloud-based integrated IDE that is essentially a cross-platform editor that enables developers to run web development projects and write and edit instantly. Codeanywhere is written in JavaScript. It provides a facility to run the code on your virtual machines through SSH and FTP from its environment.
Top Features:
- Integrated with Git, GitHub, and Bitbucket.
- Supports cloud services within its environment.
- In-built debugger to debug the code.
- Smart error recognition.
- In-built terminal to run the commands.
- Support for third-party servers available.
- Heroku deployment facility is available.
PHPStorm
PHPStorm is very powerful and recognized as the best IDE for web development among web developers. By its name, it looks like this editor supports only PHP, but that is not the case as PHPStorm supports HTML, CSS, PHP, Javascript, etc. It is strongly advised for the developers working with WordPress, Drupal, Magneto, etc. PHPStorm is available for Windows, Linux as well as macOS.
Top Features:
- In-built debugger.
- Very easy-to-use and great UI.
- Easily integrates with frameworks and CMS, such as WordPress.
- Code refactoring available.
- Support for MySQL available.
- Smart autocomplete and suggestion provider.
- Allows unit testing in PHP or frameworks based on PHP.
- In-built command-line interface.
Aptana Studio 3
Aptana Studio 3 is an open-source integrated development environment for web development. Aptana Studio 3 supports a wide range of languages, including Ruby, Python, PHP, and more. Aptana Studio 3 is available for Windows, Linux, and macOS. Developed by Aptana Inc., it is a useful web development IDE with features such as debugging, code compilation, and integrated documentation.
Top Features:
- In-built debugger support.
- Code assist facility available.
- Smart syntax analyzer to detect syntax errors.
- Automatic code formatting.
- Integrated PHP manual and PHP server deployment support.
- Plugin support available.
- The command-line facility is available.
Codepen
Although Codepen is a web-based community of web developers providing their work online, this website’s main core is the Codepen web development IDE. Codepen is entirely cloud-based, and therefore the developers just need a browser and internet connection to work on it. Codepen is a very fast and popularly used IDE for web development. As an open-source IDE, it operates as an online code-editor and provides a learning environment for developers to create code snippets.
Top Features:
- Provides community support within.
- Capabilities to share the code with everyone easily.
- Allows live view and live sync of the website.
CKEditor
CKEditor is a WYSIWYG text editor that is developed in the JavaScript programming language. CKEditor allows writing the code directly inside the web page and developing the web application directly through it. CKEditor supports all the web programming languages for smoother web page development.
Top Features:
- In-built spell checker.
- Autocomplete and syntax checker.
- Supports @ mention for collaborative editing and development.
- Highly customizable.
- Supports rich text features.
XCode
XCode is a tool-rich IDE for web development and other purposes available only for the Mac operating system. XCode can be fully integrated with Cocoa and Cocoa Touch, allowing users to create the operating system tools. Apple Inc. has recently launched its updated stable version of the IDE, 12.1, on October 20, 2020. The Command Line Tools (CLT), included in XCode, enables UNIX-style development via macOS’s Terminal app.
Top Features:
- Takes advantage of the LLVM compiler.
- It contains an interface builder.
- Smart analyzer to analyze the code.
- Includes a lot of tools for web development.
- The command-line tool is available for testing.
Conclusion
With the rapid development of technology, web development has become a profession that is very popular with young people. The emergence of the IDE (Integrated Development Environment) in recent years has played a very important role in programming, and it is very important to choose the right IDE for website development.